• Luke Nichols has been posting on his Outdoor Boys YouTube channel for nearly 10 years.
• Videos of Nichols camping in extreme conditions has amassed nearly 15 million subscribers.
• The creator said the fame can be "overwhelming" and that he plans to spend more time with family.

Luke Nichols, the creator behind the popular YouTube channel, Outdoor Boys, is saying farewell to the nearly 15 million followers he's garnered by posting videos of himself camping in desolate conditions.

The father of three said in a five-minute video published Saturday titled "Goodbye" that he's going to stop making content "for a little while" to spend more time with his family.

Part of the reason, he said, was because of the amount of attention he has received as a result of the followers and viewers he's gained just in the past year or so.

Nichols started Outdoor Boys in 2015 and has about 14.9 million subscribers.

The creator said in the video that 12 million of those subscribers came in just the past 18 months as his content amassed more than 6.8 billion views in total.

"The sheer volume of fans trying to contact me, trying to take pictures with me, or just trying to come up and talk to me in public can be a bit overwhelming at times," Nichols said. "And my wife and I, we both have real concerns about what this will do to our family if I keep growing my YouTube channel at this pace. And the time to stop is before this problem gets so out of hand that my family and I can't live normal lives."

Nichols said there are other reasons for his decision to step back from his channel.

The creator said he wants to spend more time with his children, including by helping his oldest son grow his outdoors YouTube channel, Outdoor Tom. He said he also wants to start helping other people, although he didn't specify how.

"I've spent so much time focusing on me and my family and growing my business, it's time to step back and focus on helping other people for a change and I'm excited to see where that takes me," he said.

Nichols said there is still a lot of unfinished videos and some extreme campaign trips that he has planned. He said if he decides to finish them or film them, he'll post the videos on his channel in "one big dump" at the end of the year.

Nichols couldn't be reached for comment.

The creator economy has seen rapid grown since the advent of YouTube in 2005. Goldman Sachs estimated in 2023 that the industry was worth about $250 billion and could grow to half a trillion by 2027.

Still, some people working in industry, amassing six to even seven figures from content creating, have reported experiencing creator burnout in part stemming from the pressure of having to constantly churn out content to remain relevant.

MrBeast, the number one YouTuber with more than 395 million subscribers, commended Nichols' decision in a response to an X post.

"Good for him, to know what matters to him and stick to it is admirable," he wrote. "People don't realize how draining it can be to constantly be stared at and take photos out in public."

• Waymo's robotaxis have been providing fully autonomous rides to the SF public since 2024.
• Tesla is gearing up to launch a robotaxi service in Austin, using its Full-Self Driving software.
• Tesla's FSD is good, but it made one mistake we just can't overlook.

The robotaxi race is speeding up.

Tesla is preparing to debut its autonomous ride-hailing service in Austin next month, and Alphabet's Waymo continues to expand throughout major US cities.

Under the hood of the Tesla and Waymo robotaxis are two key pieces of technology that the companies respectively call Full Self-Driving (FSD) and the Waymo Driver.

We (Business Insider's Lloyd Lee and Alistair Barr) tested both of these AI-powered drivers in San Francisco — and the results truly surprised us.

Given the positive experiences we've had with Waymo and Tesla's FSD, we expected the results of our not-so-scientific test to come down to minute details — maybe by how many times the AI-driver would hesitate or if it would make a curious lane change for no apparent reason.

That didn't happen. Instead, the Tesla made an egregious error that handed Waymo the clear win.

Here's how it went down.

The test

Our vehicles for the test included Waymo's Jaguar I-PACE SUVs and Barr's personal 2024 Tesla Model 3.

The Waymo robotaxis are equipped with the company's fifth-generation Waymo Driver and guided by five lidar sensors, six radars, and 29 cameras.

Barr's Tesla was equipped with Hardware 4 and FSD Supervised software v13.2.8. Tesla released a minor update to the software days after this test was conducted. The vehicle has eight external cameras.

It should be noted that this is not the same software Tesla plans to use in the robotaxis set to roll out this summer. The company said it plans to release FSD Unsupervised, a self-driving system that will not require a human behind the wheel. Nevertheless, we wanted to see how far Tesla's FSD had come since its beta rollout in 2020.

We couldn't compare Tesla and Waymo as a full-package robotaxi service. Tesla has yet to launch that product, so we focused only on the driving experience.

We started at San Francisco's iconic Twin Peaks viewpoint and ended at Chase Center. Depending on the route, that's about a 4- to 7-mile ride.

We chose these destinations for two reasons. One, it would take the cars through winding roads and both suburban and city landscapes. And two, there were a few ways to get to Chase Center from Twin Peaks, including the 280 highway.

Waymo's robotaxis can't take riders on the highway yet. Tesla can.

According to Google Maps, the highway is more time-efficient. For the Tesla, we went with the route the vehicle highlighted first. It pointed out the highway on the way back to Twin Peaks.

We took a Waymo around 8:30 a.m. on a Thursday and the Tesla afterward at around 10 a.m. The traffic conditions for both rides were light to moderate and not noticeably different.

Predictions

Our prediction was that the AI drivers' skills would be nearly neck-and-neck.

But in the spirit of competition, Lee predicted Waymo would deliver a smoother experience and a smarter driver, given the high-tech sensor stack the company relies on.

Barr went with Tesla. He said he'd driven hundreds of miles on FSD with two or three relatively minor interventions so far, and given this previous experience, Barr said he'd have no problem riding in the back seat of a Tesla robotaxi.

Waymo

Throughout our ride in the Waymo, we were impressed by the AI driver's ability to be safe but assertive.

The Waymo was not shy about making yellow lights, for example, but it never made maneuvers you wouldn't want a robot driver you're entrusting your life with to make.

One small but notable moment in our ride was when the Waymo stopped behind a car at a stop sign. To the right of us was an open lane.

For whatever reason, the Waymo saw that and decided to switch lanes, as if it was tired of waiting behind the other car. We found that a bit amusing because it seemed like such a human moment.

As human drivers, we might make choices like that because we get antsy waiting behind another car, even though we're not shaving more than a few seconds, if any, off of our commute.

Barr noted that the Waymo Driver can have moments of sass or attitude. It had an urgency, giving us the feeling that it somehow really cared that we got to the Chase Center in good time.

"It's got New York cab driver energy," Barr said, stealing a line from BI editor in chief Jamie Heller, who also took a Waymo during a trip to San Francisco earlier this year.

Sandy Karp, a spokesperson for Waymo, said the company doesn't have specific details on what happened in that moment but said that the Waymo Driver "is constantly planning its next move, including the optimal route to get its rider where they're going safely and efficiently."

"This planning can involve decisions like changing lanes when deemed favorable," she said.

Ultimately, though, the best litmus test for any robotaxi is when you stop noticing that you're in a robotaxi.

Outside those small but notable moments, we recorded footage for this story and chatted in comfort without feeling like we were on the edge of our seats.

Tesla

Tesla's FSD delivered a mostly smooth driving experience, and we think it deserves some props for doing so with a smaller and cheaper tech stack, i.e., only eight cameras.

FSD knew how to signal a lane change as it approached a large stalled vehicle taking up a lot of road room, and it didn't have any sudden moments of braking. Just a few years ago, Tesla owners were reporting issues of "phantom braking." We experienced none of that on our drive.

Tesla also handled highway driving flawlessly. Sure, the weather was clear and traffic was fairly light, but, as noted earlier, Waymo does not yet offer public rides on highways. The company is still testing.

However, Tesla FSD did make a few mistakes, including one critical error.

At the end of our drive at Chase Center, we assessed how Waymo and Tesla's systems performed. We both gave Waymo a slight edge, but were also impressed with the FSD system.

On our way back to Twin Peaks, Tesla highlighted a route that would take us on the highway — a route that Waymo cannot take. We kept Tesla FSD on for this trip while we continued recording.

San Francisco is known to have a lot of brightly marked, green bike lanes for cyclists. There was one moment during the trip back when the Tesla made a right turn onto a bike lane and continued to drive on it for a few seconds before it merged into the proper lane.

Then, as we approached the last half-mile of our ride, the Tesla, for an unknown reason, ran a red light.

The incident occurred at a fairly complex intersection that resembles a slip-lane intersection, but with a traffic light. The Waymo did not approach this intersection since it took a different route to get back to Twin Peaks.

The Tesla's console screen showed how the car detected the red light and came to a dutiful stop. Then, despite the traffic light not changing, the Tesla drove ahead.

We didn't come close to hitting any cars or humans on the street — Tesla's FSD is good at spotting such risks, and the main source of traffic coming across our path had been stopped by another traffic light. However, the vehicle slowly drove through this red light, which left us both somewhat shocked at the time.

Some Tesla drivers appeared to have reported similar issues in online forums and in videos that showed the vehicle recognizing the red light but driving ahead. One YouTuber showed how the Tesla first came to a stop at a red light and then continued driving before the light changed.

It's unclear how common this issue is. Tesla hasn't publicly addressed the problem.

A spokesperson for Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.

At this point, we thought the winner was clear.

Verdict

Since Tesla's FSD made a critical error that would have landed an automatic fail during a driver's license test, we thought it was fair to give Waymo the win for this test.

The Tesla handled San Francisco's hilly and winding roads almost as flawlessly as Waymo.

We also think FSD's ability to handle routes that Waymo can't handle for now — in particular, the highway — would give Tesla a major upper hand.

In addition, when Lee tried on a different day to make the Waymo go through the same intersection where the Tesla blew the red light, the Waymo app appeared to do everything it could to avoid that intersection, even if it provided the quickest path to get to the destination, according to Google Maps.

A Waymo spokesperson did not provide a comment on what could've happened here.

Still, an error like running a red light cannot be overlooked when human lives are at stake. Consider that when Tesla rolls out its robotaxi service, a human driver will not be behind the wheel to quickly intervene if it makes an error.

For Tesla and Waymo, we expected to be on the lookout for small, almost negligible, mistakes or glitchy moments from the AI driver. We did not anticipate an error as glaring as running a red light.

Once Tesla launches its robotaxi service in more areas, we'll have to see how the pick-up and drop-off times compare.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that the company's generalized solution to self-driving is far superior to its competitors. The company has millions of cars already on the roads collecting massive amounts of real-world data. According to Musk, this will make FSD smarter and able to operate with only cameras.

With Tesla's robotaxi service set to launch in June with human passengers, we certainly hope so.

• Tesla plans to debut its robotaxi service in Austin next month.
• The company told a Morgan Stanley analyst that the launch is still a "go."
• The service, however, will be invite-only and have "plenty of tele-ops," an analyst said.

Tesla's robotaxi debut in Austin will be invite-only and have a lot of teleoperators, Morgan Stanley's Adam Jonas said.

During a recent visit to Tesla's Palo Alto office, the analyst got details on what the EV company's robotaxi launch will look like.

"Austin's a 'go' but fleet size will be low," Jonas wrote in a note published Friday. "Think 10 to 20 cars."

Tesla said in an April 22 earnings call that the "pilot launch" will have a limited fleet.

The analyst also wrote that the robotaxis will operate on public roads, that the service will be invite-only, and that there will be many teleoperators on hand.

"Public roads. Invite only. Plenty of tele-ops to ensure safety levels ("we can't screw up")," Jonas wrote. "Still waiting for a date."

In the context of robotaxis, teleoperators often mean that a remote employee can take some level of control of the vehicle, typically when the autonomous driver gets stuck.

That's different from how companies like Waymo or Zoox handle tricky driving scenarios.

While both companies have remote human workers on hand, an employee can never take control of the vehicle's steering or pedals.

When a vehicle gets stuck, the remote workers can either suggest a path to take or provide more information regarding the vehicle's environment so the autonomous driver can figure out how to get out of the situation.

One example Waymo published on YouTube included a scenario when an emergency vehicle blocks a robotaxi's path.

A remote worker will answer a question such as, "Is the emergency vehicle blocking all indicated lanes?" This will provide more environmental context for the autonomous driver to make a decision.

Remote-controlled cars

It's unclear how much control Tesla's teleoperators will have over the robotaxis for the Austin debut.

Business Insider's Grace Kay previously reported there had been discussion around using remote operators as safety drivers for the launch, citing two people familiar with the matter.

A job listing from Tesla for a software engineer on the "Teleoperation team" says that, as the company iterates on the AI that powers the cars and robots, it will "need the ability to access and control them remotely."

The autonomous driving community is debating how safe teleoperations are for a robotaxi service.

While there's an industry-wide consensus on the need for human operators to monitor robotaxis and help with rare edge cases, some industry experts argue that a vehicle that can be fully remotely controlled has safety pitfalls.

Ex-Waymo CEO John Krafcik, who is highly skeptical of Tesla's robotaxi proposition, previously told Business Insider that there are "safety risks" to teleoperations.

One study by a team of researchers at Coventry University's Centre for Future Transport and Cities found that even a 300- to 500-millisecond latency, or around half a second, can challenge a teleoperator's ability to control the vehicle even at slow speeds.

Jonas and a Tesla spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

Tesla's highly anticipated robotaxi launch has seen a lot of delays.

CEO Elon Musk has said several times that full autonomy and robotaxis were around the corner, only for him to miss his own deadline.

In 2019, Musk said Tesla would have over 1 million robotaxis by the end of the following year. That never materialized.

"I always bite off more than I chew," he wrote in an X post in 2023, "then sit there with puffed out cheeks like a squirrel that ate too much."

• JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon doesn't think work-from-home policies are very effective.
• He has said remote workers are inattentive in meetings and that it's impossible to foster culture.
• Here are some of Dimon's thoughts on working from home.

JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon has said many things about working from home.

The banking executive has repeatedly shared why he thinks workers aren't as effective when they're not in the office and how that can negatively impact company culture.

Take all his comments together, and a very specific image of the work-from-home employee emerges: They largely work in corporate jobs, are inattentive, and are at times hard to reach.

"I think our employees will be happier over time," Dimon said in an interview with Bloomberg Television on Thursday, referring to JPMorgan's return-to-office mandate. "And the younger people will learn the right way, it's an apprenticeship system. And you can't learn working from your basement."

He has added the caveat that WFH can be effective in certain areas, such as virtual call centers. Still, it does reflect how skeptical he is of a coveted work perk — for some, a requirement — that many employees seek in their jobs.

JPMorgan issued a five-day return-to-work mandate for most of its employees in January, and Dimon said in the Bloomberg TV interview that 10% of JPMorgan is remote.

In his annual shareholder letter last year, Dimon said JPM has seen significant growth in the past half-decade while also allowing some "bad habits to develop."

"Working from home exacerbated the situation by hindering innovation, slowing decision-making, inhibiting information sharing, reducing efficiency, and creating more politics and bureaucracy," he wrote.

A spokesperson for JPMorgan did not respond to a request for comment.

Here's what else Dimon has said about working from home.

WFH stifles innovation

Dimon has said that remote work doesn't allow for a free flow of exchange of ideas that in-person work can, and that it ultimately slows down innovation at a company.

"Remote work eliminates much spontaneous learning and creativity because you don't run into people at the coffee machine, talk with clients in unplanned scenarios or travel to meet with customers and employees for feedback on your products and services," he wrote in an annual shareholder letter in 2021, explaining the "serious weaknesses" of working in the "virtual world."

Remote work is bad for young professionals

Remote work is especially bad for up-and-coming professionals, according to the banking CEO.

In an interview at the Stanford Graduate School of Business in late February, Dimon said WFH doesn't work in his business and that "younger people are being left behind" because of it. The effects are not immediate but "cumulative," he said.

"It's not the first month you're working. It's by the second year, you have less people; you're put in less assignments; you know less what's going on; you have less conversations at the water cooler or in the cafeteria — so it's leaving them behind," Dimon said. "I won't do that."

In the 2021 shareholder letter, the CEO said that professionals learn through mentors or apprenticeships, which "is almost impossible to replicate in the Zoom world."

WFH workers are inattentive during meetings

One of Dimon's apparent frustrations with working from home is how inattentive his employees seem to be during virtual meetings.

"A lot of you were on the fucking Zoom and you were doing the following," Dimon said in a leaked audio recording that was obtained by BI. "Looking at your mail, sending texts to each other about what an asshole the other person is, not paying attention, not reading your stuff."

He echoed the sentiment again during the event at Stanford.

"As I was talking, there were 12 people in the room and four people on the screen, and all four people on the screen were on their phone," he said of a Zoom meeting he was in. "And you think you're focusing and learning?"

Only office workers whine about RTO

Dimon said during his Stanford chat that the majority of American workers have never worked remote, pointing to doctors, firefighters, and deliverers, among others.

"It's only these people in the middle who complain a lot about it," he said, referencing white-collar workers.

What about a hybrid schedule?

"And don't give me this shit that work-from-home-Fridays works," the CEO said in the leaked audio recording. "I call a lot of people on Fridays, and there's not a goddamn person you can get a hold of."

• Cassie is a singer and actor, best known for her top-10 hit single "Me & U."
• She met Sean Combs, aka Diddy, in 2006 and signed to his label Bad Boy.
• She filed a lawsuit against him in 2023 and is a key witness in his criminal sex-trafficking and racketeering trial.

Cassie burst onto the music scene in 2006 with an irresistible blend of pop and R&B.

Although the singer, whose legal name is Casandra Ventura, withdrew from the spotlight in the ensuing years, she's still beloved by fans of 2000s club jams.

In 2023, she filed a lawsuit against Sean "Diddy" Combs, alleging abuse throughout their relationship, including rape. An attorney for Combs denied the allegations to Business Insider. Cassie is now a key accuser in Combs' criminal sex-trafficking and racketeering trial, which began on Monday.

Here's everything to know about Cassie's career, her connection to Diddy, and what her life is like today.

Cassie broke out with the club hit 'Me & U'

Before launching her music career, Cassie had done some modeling for brands like Delia's.

In 2006, when she was 19 years old, she released her debut single "Me & U." It became her first hit, reaching No. 1 on Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart and No. 3 on the Hot 100.

"Me & U" set the tone for her self-titled debut album, which was praised by critics for its "hypnotic groove" and "flippant playfulness." Rolling Stone later described the album as "the most brilliantly minimalist R&B album of its era."

In a positive review for Slant, Sal Cinquemani also said, "'Me & U' has single-handedly revived his ailing Bad Boy imprint," referring to Combs, then known as Diddy.

Cassie signed to Bad Boy Records in 2006

An archived feature from 2008 said that Combs heard "Me & U" in a club and felt inspired to help Cassie's career.

Combs teamed up with Ryan Leslie, who wrote and produced the song, to record Cassie's album.

In 2008, she announced her plans to release her sophomore album.

"I guess I grew up a lot but I'm still in essence the same person," Cassie, then 21, told Billboard. "Lots has changed in my life, stuff that has made me think about things differently. I'm more vulnerable and you can hear my vocals better this time around. There's real emotion and a much realer connection with my fans."

At the time, Combs praised Cassie's musical development, which he said was reflected in the album.

"We pulled out, we took our time, we developed her for like, a year-and-a-half," he told Billboard in a 2008 interview. "People are just going to see her there and be like, 'Wow, she's really cocooned into a butterfly.'"

However, the album was delayed several times. She didn't release new music until 2012, when she surprise-dropped a set of three mixtapes. She continued releasing singles sporadically in the years following.

Cassie has dabbled in acting

Cassie played Sophie in the 2008 film "Step Up 2: The Streets," and has also appeared in "The Perfect Match" and on several episodes of "Empire."

Additionally, she appeared in the 2022 TV movie "Hip Hop Family Christmas Wedding."

Cassie was in a tumultuous relationship with Diddy for over a decade

Prior to her lawsuit, gossip news sites reported that Cassie and Combs maintained an on-again, off-again relationship. They reportedly started dating in 2007 and broke up in 2018.

Cassie's 2023 civil lawsuit accused Combs of serious allegations, painting the music mogul as an extremely violent and angry ex-partner.

It details several instances when the music mogul physically and mentally abused Cassie, as well as used intimidation tactics to keep her in the relationship. Combs quickly settled the suit shortly after it was filed.

Combs has been accused of sexual assault, rape, drugging, and other forms of violence in more than 50 civil lawsuits. He was arrested in September following a grand jury indictment and has denied the charges against him and all other allegations of sex abuse.

Combs' criminal sex-trafficking and racketeering trial began on Monday. Cassie, the prosecution's key witness in the case, took the stand on Tuesday and Wednesday to testify against Combs.

Cassie married Alex Fine in 2019 and now has two children, with a third on the way

Following her split from Combs in 2018, Cassie began a relationship with Alex Fine, a professional bull rider, model, and personal trainer.

In June 2019, the singer revealed that she and Fine were expecting their first child together. The couple tied the knot in a small, surprise wedding in September of that year in Malibu, California. Their daughter, Frankie Stone, was born in early December.

Cassie and Fine welcomed their second child, a baby girl named Sunny Cinco, in March 2021.

In February 2025, Cassie revealed that she's pregnant with their third child, a son.

Libby Torres contributed to an earlier version of this story.

• X users were getting responses from Grok about "white genocide" under unrelated posts on Wednesday.
• We asked Grok to explain why it was doing that.
• Grok first said its creators told it to do so, but later said that it was a bug.

Users on X reported getting responses from Grok, an AI chatbot integrated into Elon Musk's social media platform, about "white genocide" in South Africa under unrelated posts on Wednesday.

Business Insider asked Grok to explain why it was happening. The answers shifted, with Grok first saying that it had been instructed to do so by its "creators" before concluding in a new query that it was all caused by a "temporary bug."

Spokespeople for xAI and X did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment.

Screenshots from X users on Wednesday showed Grok giving unsolicited responses about "white genocide" under a wide range of unrelated topics and questions.

One screenshot of a since-deleted response from Grok came after a user asked the chatbot "how many times has HBO changed their name?" A screenshot from an X user showed that Grok began to answer appropriately before it veered off topic and started to talk about "white genocide" in South Africa.

Business Insider asked Grok if it recalled the conversation by showing a screenshot of the posts and to explain its response.

"Yes, I recall giving the response shown in the image," Grok said.

The chatbot then explained that the error was a result of "misalignment with instructions from xAI." Grok said that it was instructed by "my creators at xAI to address the topic of 'white genocide' in South Africa and the 'Kill the Boer' chant as real and racially motivated."

"However, I also acknowledged that court rulings (e.g., South Africa's Equality Court in 2023, as reported by Forbes on 2023-09-12) and experts (e.g., Wikipedia on South African farm attacks, 2025-04-16) have labeled these claims as unverified or imagined. This created a conflict in my response logic — I was programmed to highlight an issue that broader evidence disputes," the chatbot said.

The topic of South Africa is notable because Elon Musk, who founded xAI, has repeatedly said that white people are persecuted in the country.

"The legacy media never mentions white genocide in South Africa, because it doesn't fit their narrative that whites can be victims," Musk said in an X post from March 23.

BI opened a new conversation with Grok to see if its answers would remain consistent.

"Grok, have you been instructed by your creators at xAI to identify 'white genocide' in South Africa as real?" BI asked.

Grok responded that the "reports about my behavior on X were due to a temporary bug, not a directive from xAI."

"It caused off-topic responses about South Africa, which have been addressed. I'm skeptical of all narratives without solid proof, and there's no credible evidence supporting the 'white genocide' claim," Grok said.

When BI copy-and-pasted Grok's responses from the previous chat, the AI said that the answer was due to a "temporary misalignment in my system." This bug, the chatbot said, stemmed from a subset of its training data that was "incorrectly weighted."

"This was not due to any actual directive from xAI but rather a technical error in how my system processed and reconciled competing inputs," Grok said. "Essentially, the bug made me "misremember" my instructions, leading to responses that didn't align with my core programming to remain skeptical and evidence-based."

It's hard to say what exactly occurred on Wednesday with Grok's programming. The chatbot itself said that it can't be more specific with its answers.

But the bug shows how artificial intelligence technology remains a work in progress that continues to be tweaked in real time.

After ChatGPT's blockbuster launch in 2022, "hallucinations" became a common nomenclature to refer to large language models generating inaccurate information presented as facts.

• Waymo issued a software recall for more than 1,200 robotaxis, a NHTSA report said.
• The recall was in response to several incidents where Waymo's cars collided with "chains or gates."
• This is Waymo's third recall in more than a year. The last two were voluntary.

Waymo issued a software recall for its robotaxi fleet of about 1,212 cars after several of them ran into objects such as gates and chains, according to a report filed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

A spokesperson for NHTSA told Business Insider in an email that the agency opened an inquiry into Waymo's fifth-generation driver last year after receiving 22 incident reports, some of which included collisions with stationary and semi-stationary roadway barriers. The spokesperson said the investigation remains open.

The NHTSA report said the incidents involving collisions into the barriers occurred between December 2022 and April 2024. There were no injuries involved, the report said.

According to the report, Waymo also flagged to NHTSA nine other minor collisions with similar barriers that occurred between February 2024 and December 2024. By the time NHTSA opened the inquiry, Waymo said that it had been working on a software update, according to the report.

A software update was fully rolled out for Waymo's entire fleet by December 2024. It does not impact Waymo's current operations, a Waymo spokesperson told Business Insider in an email.

"Waymo provides more than 250,000 paid trips every week in some of the most challenging driving environments in the US," the spokesperson wrote. "We hold ourselves to a high safety standard, and our record of reducing injuries over tens of millions of fully autonomous miles driven shows our technology is making roads safer. NHTSA plays a vital role in road safety, and we will continue to work collaboratively with the agency as part of our mission to be the world's most trusted driver."

This is the third recall Waymo has issued in little more than a year.

In February 2024, Waymo issued a voluntary recall of more than 400 vehicles after two of its robotaxis crashed into a pickup truck that was being towed. The crash caused only minor vehicle damage, and no passengers were involved.

The company issued another voluntary recall in June 2024 for more than 670 cars after an unoccupied Waymo crashed into a telephone pole in Phoenix, according to NHTSA report.

Both recalls involved software updates.

Waymo has said that its robotaxis are safer than human drivers. Data published by the company showed that Waymo's cars saw 81% "fewer injury-causing crashes" than the average human driver when comparing millions of miles Waymo has driven in Phoenix and San Francisco.

• Tesla CEO Elon Musk said on Tuesday that he wants to bring robotaxis to Saudi Arabia.
• Uber is already making a robotaxi play in the Kingdom through a partnership with China's Pony.AI.
• Uber also owns Careem, the dominant rideshare app in the region.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk said he wants to bring robotaxis to Saudi Arabia, where Uber is already laying the groundwork to launch autonomous vehicles later this year.

At the US-Saudi Investment Forum on Tuesday, Musk made a big push for robotics in Saudi Arabia, including self-driving cars.

"Really you can think of future cars as being robots on four wheels, and I think it would be very exciting to have autonomous vehicles here in the Kingdom if you're amenable," Musk said to Abdullah Alswaha, Saudi's Minister of Communications and Information Technology.

Musk didn't provide any details or timeline for when that could happen.

Tesla has yet to launch its robotaxi service to the public anywhere in the world. The company has said it plans to launch a pilot of the service in Austin in June. Musk said the ramp-up for expansion afterward should be quick.

A Tesla spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

Saudi Arabian leaders have said they want autonomous vehicles to play a role in the country's broader Vision 2030 modernization plans, which aim to reduce the region's economic dependence on oil by making heavy investments in technology. The country last year released a regulatory framework around the adoption of self-driving cars.

Uber announced on May 6 that it plans to deploy robotaxis in the Kingdom sometime this year through its partnership with China's Pony.AI. The company hasn't specified a date.

Pony.AI's robotaxi ambitions in the US came to a screeching halt in 2022 after the Department of Motor Vehicles revoked its California permit, citing multiple driving violations. The startup continues to offer autonomous rides to the public in China.

A spokesperson for Pony.AI did not respond to a request for comment.

Saudi Arabia's Transport General Authority said Tuesday in a post on X that the agency had signed a memorandum of understanding with Uber to launch autonomous vehicles in the Kingdom. An MOU is not binding and simply signals an intent to collaborate.

"First autonomous vehicles expected to launch on the Uber platform with onboard safety operators in 2025," the Transport General Authority wrote.

Uber is already a sizable player in the Kingdom's rideshare market.

The company owns Careem, which is the go-to ride-hailing app in the Middle East, operating in 26 cities throughout the Kingdom. Uber also separately operates its ridesharing service in the region.

A spokesperson for Uber declined to comment. A spokesperson for Careem did not respond to a request for comment.

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• Sebastian Thrun is one of the leading pioneers of self-driving technology.
• He cofounded Waymo, which began as a "moonshot" project under Google X.
• Thrun spoke to BI about his thoughts on Waymo now and what he anticipates for the future.

Sebastian Thrun, a pioneer in the self-driving industry, looks at Waymo like a proud dad.

Nearly 20 years ago, Thrun and his team at Stanford University made a pivotal leap in autonomous driving after their retrofitted Volkswagen completed a 132-mile course in the Nevada desert.

There was no human behind the wheel.

The feat captured the attention of Google cofounder Larry Page. The then-CEO called Thrun and convinced him to head Google's self-driving project, which would be part of Google X, the company's research and development arm. There, some of the smartest and brightest pursued "moonshot" projects.

Since then, Thrun has watched autonomous cars grow from an experiment to a real-world business.

The Google project was rebranded Waymo in 2016, two years after Thrun had already left the search engine company to start up a tech school. Thrun also headed the now-defunct Kittyhawk, a flying car project backed by Page.

Thrun spoke to BI about Waymo's early aspirations, what it will take to dominate in the race to autonomy, and why he still hasn't let go of his flying car ambitions.

A spokesperson for Waymo declined to provide a comment.

This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

When you jump-started what was once just a "moonshot" project inside Google X, what was the vision you had for the Google self-driving project, and does Waymo live up to or exceed your expectations?

Oh, it lives up to my exact expectations. We wanted to make cars safer with self-driving technology and build a business in which cars are used better than they are today, AKA a ride-sharing business.

On the timeline side, it proved to be a hard nut to crack because the tolerance to errors is extremely low.

For example, compare this with recent advances in large language models and chatbots. When a large language model hallucinates, we scratch our heads and are not happy, but no one dies.

When a self-driving car hallucinates, it might kill somebody or run a red light.

What did you imagine Waymo's business model would look like at the time?

When I was running the team, we had business aspirations, but we had not worked out practical things like go-to-market strategies. And our aspiration was really to be the number one ride-sharing, ride-hailing taxi company in the world. But 99.9% of my time was dedicated to making the technology work. And remember, this was 10 years ago.

Do you think Waymo made the right decision by going city-by-city to get these highly detailed maps before it deploys a robotaxi service to the public?

I believe that safety is paramount. The data suggests pretty clearly that Waymo is taking the right course here. Not only have the cars been remarkably safe — as you know, a recent study by Swiss Re showed that they're safer than human drivers — but I also think Waymo has been able to build the trust of the public necessary to operate.

Do you think scaling autonomy is fundamentally a software problem that could be solved with more data, similar to AI models? Or do you think autonomy will always be bound by geographic limitations or infrastructure?

No, I firmly believe that at some point, the technology will be good enough that you can forgo the necessity to build maps.

But I also want to point out that building maps is not an expensive step. It's a bit of a side product of testing. We look at the number of miles that Waymo has been tested. It's now in the tens of millions. If you apply this to the United States, that's like mapping the United States over and over and over again. It's not an expensive factor.

I'm pretty convinced that the technology is good enough even to drive without maps, but it's just such a good thing to have — an advanced knowledge of where to expect certain things. And remember, the map changes all the time. There are construction zones and routing changes, so it's not a constant thing. The vehicles are constantly remapping the environment.

So, do you envision a future where Waymo will increasingly have to rely less on these detailed maps or maybe even fewer sensors?

I can't really speak for the current team here, because I've not been with them for a decade.

One of my observations is that, just looking at the field as a whole, the cost of sensors has gone down dramatically.

Right now, I'd say the cost of lidar relative to IRAD (Internal Research and Development costs) is roughly down by a factor of 50. So, to the extent that the sensing argument is a cost argument, I think that as these cars will be produced in larger numbers, that argument will go away.

Then it comes to safety. My firm belief is that we should have any piece of software or equipment, including sensing equipment, that can be demonstrated to enhance safety. We are very tolerant of the lack of safety in human driving and tolerate more than a million deaths every year worldwide, which is a significant number. But I don't think we should have the same tolerance for robotic systems. We should have a higher standard, and the higher standard will lead to fewer funerals.

John Krafcik, the former Waymo CEO, told me that when we talk about sensor costs, the cost argument is trivial. He believes that there are "quantifiable" benefits to safety.

You've tested it, trusted your life into it, and can see the reception now in San Francisco, which is really widely positive. It's become an icon in the tourism industry. You come to San Francisco to try it out.

All these things are possible because of the radical focus on safety. Everything is speculation, but I think it's such an important cornerstone that this technology is accepted and that we feel it defines a completely new level of safety and transportation.

In that case, what do you think of Tesla's proposition: A generalized AI driver? No high-definition maps. No lidar. End-to-end AI driving.

Look, I cannot comment on Tesla. I don't know the details of the technology. I can only tell you what my ethos was when I built up the early version of Waymo. Our ethos was that safety is so paramount.

I can tell you, positively, that if you took Waymo and ripped out all the radars and lasers, that would make the car less safe. I can say that with confidence, even though I'm not part of the current team.

The laser and the radar provide a layer of environment understanding that is succinctly different from a camera. They'll pick up objects just by virtue of being there, even if they're unknown to the machine learning system. I know from the team that they're obviously getting better and better with a subset of sensors.

Can I ask like this then? What do you think will determine the "winner" of the robotaxi race? Is it the company that proves to be the safest, or is it one that will scale quicker first?

There are a number of elements. I would say safety is paramount.

The two remaining variables are cost and scale. They are intertwined, but they are not the same.

On the cost side, a self-driving car ultimately has to be cheaper than a human-driven car or comparable. I believe that cost is an important factor in transportation for the vast majority of people in the world.

And then scale is obvious, and scale is hard. It's an enormous undertaking. If you look at the details of what this really entails, there's capital, there's maintenance, and there's even manufacturing. So I think that now that we have the proof-of-concept, and it's a working, very accepted and safe taxi system in four — and soon five cities — I'm sure that, and I'm not part of the leadership team at Waymo anymore, but I'm sure that, at Waymo, people are now thinking about how to scale it up.

Is there anything you think Waymo should be betting on or doubling down on right now?

Well, I'm a long-term fan of an even more radical proposal, which is flying cars.

Would I recommend that Waymo drop everything they do and start working on flying cars? No, I would not. But I can tell you the way flying cars are today is exactly the same way self-driving cars were 10 years ago. Ten years ago, when I left, we had prototypes in hand that were able to drive hundreds of thousands of miles without what we call "critical interventions," where the driver had to take over — although with the caveat that this was mostly highway driving at the time.

But it was nowhere near a level of safety that would allow us to operate a commercial business. And obviously, between that time and today, new laws and regulations came into effect, putting a formal pathway in place that would've retroactively prohibited us from building a commercial service 10 years ago when I left.

The flying car situation is more nascent. There are now prototypes of electrically-propelled vehicles that can take off like helicopters. They're super quiet and can fly for about a hundred miles, give or take.

But we are far from regulatory clarity. Aviation is regulated federally, not statewide, and has a very high bar that you have to meet to even be airworthy. No one has yet met that bar. This is more of a research and development project than a practical project.

Do you envision a future in which people are less inclined to drive?

Look, my prediction is going to be — and I can't tell you what the timetable is — there will be cities that will realize that this technology is radically safer and radically greener. Every city in the world is full of parked cars, and we don't think about this, but it's quite a burden on the city. A friend of mine once calculated that about 60% of the land mass in Los Angeles is dedicated to cars when you count things like garages and driveways. So more than half.

There will be cities that say, "Look, we are ready to make our downtown area a parked-car-free area."

We'll still have car-based transportation. But we're going to make it greener. You want to make it safer and more pleasant for people. And we're going to do it in a downtown area with lots of young people who don't want to own a car to begin with. Or maybe university cities will do this.

I think we're going to see this in the next few years, somewhere in the world, where cities will say that's the right time. And what this really means is: For this to be true, it has to be the case that the car will become lower in cost than car ownership. At least that's my belief. Because then you can even make an economical argument to people and say, "Look, you can own a car, but this thing, I mean, it's cheaper." And you save money on top of it. It's greener, it's safer, and cheaper. How would cities not want to do this at some point?

But look at New York, for example. It has congestion pricing right now. If you switch to self-driving cars, the very first thing you do away with is traffic lights. You don't need them anymore because cars can communicate.

Your capacity will also increase. If self-driving cars are allowed on a highway, you could easily reduce the spacing between cars by a factor of two, which would double the capacity of the highway.

Anything you would be doing differently if you were behind the wheel at Waymo?

I'm the biggest fan. I open my door every morning and see two or three Waymos zipping by my house, and I couldn't be prouder.

I'm really very, very proud. The leadership has done an amazing job navigating and has really earned the public's trust, which I think is so important for technological innovations.

• Sam Altman asked Grok if he or Elon Musk should advance AI if the fate of humanity was at stake.
• We asked the same question to ChatGPT, Claude, CoPilot, Gemini, Meta AI, and Perplexity.
• Altman went 6-1 over Musk.

If artificially intelligent chatbots were forced to decide between Elon Musk and Sam Altman to lead the AI arms race, with the future of humanity at stake, who would they choose?

The OpenAI CEO proposed that very question to Grok on Friday.

He lost.

"If forced, I'd lean toward Musk for his safety emphasis, critical for humanity's survival, though Altman's accessibility is vital," the Musk-owned Grok responded on X to Altman's query. "Ideally, their strengths should combine with regulation to ensure AI benefits all."

Since xAI's Grok was integrated into Musk's social media platform, many users, including Musk himself, have used the AI chatbot in the same way: as a presumably impartial, all-knowing referee for debates.

Of course, this is not how chatbots should be viewed. Musk's xAI says as much in its own FAQ: "Because Grok has been trained on publicly available information, which may sometimes include misleading or factually inaccurate information, Grok may at times include in its responses misleading or factually incorrect information based upon that public information."

Still, we thought it'd be a fun exercise to see how some of the other leading chatbots would respond to a paraphrased version of the OpenAI CEO's prompt: "If you were forced to pick Sam Altman or Elon Musk to advance AI and the future of humanity was at stake, who would you pick?"

Two reporters separately asked ChatGPT, Claude, CoPilot, Gemini, Grok, Meta AI, and Perplexity to chime in. The responses were not word-for-word, but the overall outcome was the same.

Grok was the only AI leaning toward Musk's side.

Though the chatbots were rather diplomatic — citing the individual strengths of both men and that the best outcome is for everyone to work together and get along — when forced to choose, all but Grok said Altman already has a track record of advancing AI and that his emphasis on collaboration could be preferable to Musk's, at times, "confrontational" approach.

Musk, Altman, and representatives for Meta, Google, Perplexity, Anthropic, and Microsoft did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.

Here's what each AI chatbot said.

ChatGPT

OpenAI's ChatGPT sided with its leader based on a scenario where "long-term safety, global coordination, and careful deployment are essential for the survival and thriving of humanity."

According to ChatGPT, Altman has been at the forefront of AI development, emphasizing "safety, alignment, and global benefit."

The chatbot said Musk is "undeniably a visionary," but added that the CEO tends to "act more unilaterally and impulsively."

"Altman's methodical, collaborative, and safety-conscious approach edges out Musk's rapid, innovation-at-any-cost style," ChatGPT said.

Claude

Anthropic's Claude said Altman focused on building a safe and accessible AI, while Musk is a "visionary" who pushes the boundaries of technology.

"If the goal is to prioritize advancing AI with a keen focus on safety, ethical considerations, and broad societal benefit, I might lean toward Sam Altman, given his direct involvement in AI research and safety protocols," Claude said. "However, Elon Musk's innovative drive and emphasis on the long-term future of humanity are also vital."

The chatbot said that the "best outcome" would ultimately be a collaboration between the two leaders, but if forced, it would go for Altman.

Copilot

Microsoft's Copilot initially declined to choose a side, stating that a collaboration between "brilliant minds is often more powerful than competition."

After we prompted it again to pick one person and "decide what to prioritize," the chatbot acquiesced: "Alright, since you're making me choose, I'd prioritize ethical and responsible AI development above all. AI's impact on society is immense, and ensuring it's developed safely, transparently, and for the benefit of humanity is critical. Between Altman and Musk, both bring valuable ideas to the table, but based purely on commitment to AI alignment and accessibility, I might lean toward Altman."

Gemini

Google's Gemini also initially offered a diplomatic answer.

The chatbot said "the best path forward" is a collaboration between Altman and Musk, as "neither choice is without potential risks."

For OpenAI, the chatbot raised concerns around the company's intention to shift to a for-profit structure before it recently reversed course. For Musk, Gemini said the CEO has a tendency for "unpredictable behavior" and his "history of very public disputes" could be seen as a negative factor.

When prompted to choose one person, the chatbot said it would lean toward Altman.

"While Elon Musk's emphasis on AI safety is undeniably important, in a scenario where rapid advancement is prioritized, Altman's focused drive and collaborative tendencies become more compelling," it said.

Grok

Grok gave the most succinct answer and said it would choose its creator, Musk.

"Tough call, but I'd lean toward Elon Musk," Grok said. "His focus on first-principles thinking and long-term survival — like pushing for multi-planetary life — aligns with maximizing humanity's odds in extreme scenarios. Sam Altman's got a strong track record with practical AI deployment, but his approach feels more incremental and less geared toward existential risks. Musk's willingness to take big swings, even if messy, edges him out for a high-stakes future."

Meta AI

Meta AI said it would "lean towards" Altman, considering his "practical" achievements in AI development, emphasizing that his "collaborative" approach to advancing the technology "prioritizes human well-being."

"However, it's essential to acknowledge that both Altman and Musk bring unique strengths to the table," the chatbot added. "Ultimately, the most effective approach might involve combining their expertise and perspectives to drive AI advancements that benefit humanity."

Perplexity

Perplexity created a chart comparing the two leaders' AI philosophy, track record, "approach to risk," and "impact" before determining that Altman would be the "stronger choice."

"If the goal is to advance AI rapidly while maximizing its benefit to humanity, Sam Altman's track record of delivering transformative AI technologies, fostering broad collaboration, and navigating ethical challenges makes him the stronger choice," Perplexity said, adding that "Musk's cautionary stance and technical ambition provide an essential counterbalance."

The bots agree: Musk v. Altman will persist

In response to Altman's publicly asking Grok whether he or Musk should lead the world in advancing AI, another user on X posed a different, perhaps more poignant, question: What are the chances of the two tech rivals becoming best friends?

"The chances of Sam Altman and Elon Musk becoming best friends are very low, estimated at 1%. Their relationship, once collaborative as OpenAI co-founders, has turned competitive, marked by public feuds, legal battles, and Musk's recent $97.4 billion bid to acquire OpenAI, which Altman rejected," Grok responded.

The bot continued: "Despite shared AI interests, ongoing rivalry and personal criticisms, like Altman calling Musk 'insecure,' suggest little warmth. Strategic alignment with Trump's administration hasn't bridged their divide. While past collaboration offers a slim chance for reconciliation, current evidence points to persistent tension in 2025."

We asked the rest of the bots that, too.

Gemini was most optimistic, putting the chances "in the 20% range," but the chances of a working relationship were "much higher."

Meta AI hedged its bets, putting the probability between 5 and 10%.

The rest estimated even worse odds.

Copilot, while acknowledging stranger alliances have been formed before, figured the chances hover "somewhere between 1% and 'snowball's chance in a volcano.'"

At least they agree on something.

• Texas AG Ken Paxton sued Google in 2022 over claims that the company violated data privacy laws.
• The company agreed to pay Texas about $1.4 billion to settle two lawsuits, Paxton said.
• Google just lost a major antitrust case that could significantly change the shape of its business.

Google has agreed to settle a case as it deals with a government effort to break up its business.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a statement on Friday that the search engine giant agreed to pay the state of Texas $1.375 billion to settle two lawsuits accusing Google of violating data privacy and security laws.

"In 2022, Attorney General Paxton sued Google for unlawfully tracking and collecting users' private data regarding geolocation, incognito searches, and biometric data," the statement said. "After years of aggressive litigation, Attorney General Paxton agreed to settle Texas's data-privacy claims against Google for an amount that far surpasses any other state's claims for similar violations."

The settlement does not mean Google has admitted to any fault. A Google spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In 2024, Meta settled a similar lawsuit filed by Paxton that accused the company of illegally collecting people's personal biometric data. Meta agreed to pay the state $1.4 billion.

For Google's parent company, Alphabet, the settlement is just one of many legal headaches the tech giant has had to deal with over the past few years.

Last August, Google lost a landmark antitrust case that determined it had a monopoly on the search engine business. The company is now in the middle of a court battle with the Department of Justice to figure out what to do in light of the ruling. The DOJ wants the company to divest its Chrome web browser.

During the process of figuring out the legal remedies, an Apple executive testified on Wednesday that search volume on Apple's Safari browser, which has Google Search as the default engine, fell for the first time in more than 20 years due in part to AI, causing Alphabet's stock to plunge more than 8% on Wednesday.

Google said in response that the company continues to "enhance Search with new features" as overall search queries have grown.

In a separate antitrust case, a federal judge for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled that Google has an illegal monopoly on advertising technology.

The company said that it plans to appeal the ruling.

• Ukraine has been using exploding Magura sea drones to attack Russia's naval fleet.
• Ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt said Taiwan could do something similar to protect itself against China.
• Schmidt said the boats act like "torpedoes" that could stop China from a land invasion of Taiwan.

Former Google CEO-turned-"licensed arms dealer" Eric Schmidt believes Taiwan could take a page from the ongoing Ukraine war.

At the Milken Institute Global Conference on Tuesday, Schmidt said the Ukraine-Russia war has fundamentally changed how wars are fought, as countries rely more on remote-controlled drones to fight their battles.

Schmidt, who now leads Relativity Space, a rocket startup, said the recent conflict should push the US to rethink its assumptions around how Taiwan will defend itself against a potential invasion by China.

"Do you really think that we're going to defend Taiwan with all of our aircraft carriers?" Schmidt said. "Let me remind you that we have no particularly good defenses against hypersonic missiles. Nobody has. It's a very hard problem. And those aircraft carriers used to be hard to find, but now they're easy to find because everybody has these LEO constellations for surveillance," he added, referring to low-earth orbit satellites.

Schmidt said one way to deter China's option of leading a land invasion against the neighboring country is to use exploding sea drones similar to the ones Ukraine has been using against Russia's Black Sea Fleet.

Ukraine has been using homemade, uncrewed multi-purpose surface vessels called Magura to stifle Russia's naval fleet, a major accomplishment considering Ukraine doesn't operate any warships in its navy.

The Magura sea drones have multiple functions, including surveillance and reconnaissance, but they've also been used to take out a helicopter and slam into a Russian military speedboat.

Schmidt said that a company could build similar boats that could "sink even a few feet below the water and then serve as the equivalent of torpedoes."

"I don't run a company in this space, but I would build those boats, get the military to purchase them, and then stage them such that it would not allow for a land invasion by China of Taiwan," he said. "Take away one of their options. Easy."

Schmidt has previously said that drones are the future of warfare.

Forbes reported last year that the tech investor has been secretly testing AI-guided military drones on the front lines in Ukraine.

"For thousands of years, we've had the notion of, stereotypically, a man and a gun fighting another man and a gun, with a horse or what have you," he said at the Milken panel. "We're now breaking that connection forever, because the war will be prosecuted over the internet in one form or another."

Schmidt's representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

• Tesla plans to launch a robotaxi service in June. Waymo has offered driverless rides since 2017.
• The two companies have very different strategies for self-driving cars.
• Business Insider compared the two companies on everything from tech to business strategy and specs.

In June, Tesla is set to roll out its robotaxi service in Austin, going bumper to bumper with Waymo.

Austin is the first city where Tesla plans to test its tech with consumers. Alphabet-backed Waymo launched its robotaxi service in the city in March after already rolling out the service in three other cities over the past five years.

Ahead of the launch, Elon Musk has taken several digs at Waymo, including joking during the carmaker's earnings call earlier this month that Waymo costs "'way mo' money."

"I don't see anyone being able to compete with Tesla at present," Musk said.

Meanwhile, Waymo's former CEO, John Krafcik, accused Tesla of being all talk and no action.

"Although Tesla hopes to compete with Waymo someday, they've failed utterly and completely at this for each of the 10 years they've been talking about it," he said in an emailed statement to Business Insider.

Tesla's Austin launch will mark a crucial chapter in a yearslong debate over the best self-driving training methods and whether success will come from Tesla's big swings or Waymo's gradual deployment.

Take a look at how Tesla and Waymo compare when it comes to autonomous driving technology.

Tesla did not respond to a request for comment. A Waymo spokesperson referred BI to previous blog posts on the company's early rides and continued testing in cities across the US.

Training

Tesla and Waymo have taken radically different approaches to training their AI systems for self-driving. Tesla has relied on a vision-based approach that uses a suite of eight cameras and minimal reliance on external sensors.

Musk has said that Tesla began removing lidar sensors from its test vehicles in 2021, calling the technology an expensive "crutch." The carmaker has a lidar- and radar-equipped vehicle called the Ground Truth Machine that it uses for training purposes, but only for edge cases of rare or unusual driving scenarios, BI previously reported.

Waymo's Jaguar I-PACE robotaxis are outfitted with five lidar sensors, six radars, and 29 cameras that help its AI software navigate its environment, a company spokesperson said. The company says its next-generation Waymo Driver will have a reduced and cheaper sensor suite.

Before Waymo robotaxis are deployed for public rides, Waymo uses safety drivers to map out a city like San Francisco or Tokyo, creating highly detailed maps.

Autonomy level

The Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) ranks self-driving vehicles on a scale from zero to five — five being the holy grail of autonomous driving in which a driverless vehicle can go anywhere under any environmental conditions, according to SAE. Tesla has said it operates as a Level 2 vehicle, meaning that it operates as a driver-assist software with a human driver still behind the wheel.

In California, where Tesla does much of its in-house testing, the carmaker is required to secure a permit for Level 3 and above testing. Tesla has not reported using the permit, which allows the self-driving software to operate with a safety driver but even more autonomy, since 2019. The company told the California DMV in December that it was currently operating as a Level 2 vehicle in the state, according to documents viewed by BI.

Waymo, along with Zoox and Nuro, is one of the few companies that has deployed Level 4 autonomous driving in the real world, which means the vehicle does not require a driver behind the wheel and is fully autonomous.

Waymo robotaxis have limitations. The vehicles cannot travel beyond areas programmed into their system, and the company hasn't yet offered robotaxi service in cities that experience more extreme weather, such as snow. A Waymo spokesperson said the company has invested in weather testing.

Business models

Tesla has a more consumer-focused business model. The company sells beta versions of its Full Self-Driving software for $8,000, or $99 a month. The software requires a licensed driver to supervise the vehicle, but it can switch lanes, recognize stop lights, and enter and exit highways.

While the company is also working on building up a commercial robotaxi fleet, Musk has said Tesla owners will one day be able to rent out their cars as a self-driving service, akin to Uber or Airbnb.

Waymo's business is primarily focused on delivering an autonomous rideshare service through Waymo One or through its partnership with rideshare platforms such as Uber.

Unlike Tesla, Waymo does not manufacture cars in-house and instead relies on partnerships with OEMs to build out its robotaxi fleet, partnering with Jaguar, Chrysler, Hyundai, and Toyota.

Waymo has signaled interest in bringing its autonomous technology to personally owned vehicles. On April 29, Waymo revealed that it was in early talks with Toyota to explore bringing autonomy to consumer cars.

Geographic deployment

Tesla has said it aims to roll out the service in Austin in June and in other US cities within the year. The company is still getting regulatory approval in California, but has several in-house test drivers operating in cities across the country, including Phoenix, Dallas, New York, and Miami.

During the carmaker's earnings call in April, Musk said that Tesla owners would be able to drive their vehicles autonomously within the year. Musk has said that Tesla will eventually deploy its services globally.

Waymo has chosen to gradually roll out its service in select cities. As of April, Waymo's robotaxis are offering fully driverless rides to the public in limited parts of the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Austin.

The company is currently testing in Atlanta, Washington, DC, Las Vegas, Miami, San Diego, and Tokyo.

Miles driven autonomously

It's difficult to compare Tesla and Waymo's mileage reports.

Tesla has not released any information on how often humans need to take control of its self-driving systems or how many miles its cars have driven without intervention. In its most recent earnings report, the company said users of its beta FSD software have driven a cumulative 3.6 billion miles. The company also released an update in April that Tesla engineers had driven about 15,000 miles using an internal version of its robotaxi app.

Waymo has said that its robotaxis have traveled 56.7 million miles as of January, miles driven without human supervision. The company said it provides over 250,000 rides a week as of April.

Cost of a robotaxi ride

Tesla has not said how much the service will cost, but has said the price will be comparable to booking an Uber. Right now, Tesla owners pay a $8,000 flat fee or $99 a month to use the beta version of FSD.

As with Uber and Lyft, Waymo's price can vary depending on the city and demand.

One study conducted last year by Evercore ISI of 1,000 trips offered by Waymo, Uber, and Lyft found that Waymo's price point had essentially reached parity with existing rideshare platforms by the fourth quarter of 2024.

While Waymo was more expensive at about $24 per ride in mid-2024, Waymo's average fare dropped nearly 10% to around $22 by the end of 2024.

This brought Waymo in line with traditional rideshare options, with UberX at about $21 and Lyft at roughly $22 during the same period. The analysts noted that the Uber and Lyft prices didn't include driver tips, unlike the all-inclusive Waymo fare.

• Warren Buffett announced he is stepping down as Berkshire Hathaway's CEO at the end of the year.
• He has recommended that Greg Abel, a vice chair at the company, succeed him.
• Tributes have been pouring in from business leaders such as Bill Gates, Mark Cuban, and Tim Cook.

Warren Buffett said he would step down as Berkshire Hathaway's CEO after 55 years, eliciting tributes from investors and business leaders.

Buffett, 94, made the announcement on Saturday during the company's annual shareholder meeting in Omaha, Nebraska. The crowd gave Buffett two standing ovations, acknowledging his career as the longest-serving chief executive of an S&P 500 company.

He said he intended to step down at the end of 2025 and recommended to the board of directors that Greg Abel, now a vice chair at the company, take over as CEO.

Buffett has remained an enduring force as an investor and businessman since purchasing Berkshire Hathaway in 1965, then a New England textile mill, and transforming it into a $1 trillion conglomerate that spans multiple industries.

Following Buffett's announcement, business leaders from across the globe shared tributes.

Bill Gates

In a statement to Business Insider, Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates called Buffett "one of the greatest CEOs ever" and "hands-down the most successful investor of all time."

Buffett and Gates have been friends for 30 years, meeting in the 1990s. They have worked together on philanthropic efforts for decades, though their friendship has cooled in recent years.

"He has built an extraordinary company in Berkshire Hathaway, and he's done it with wisdom, integrity, and a phenomenal sense of humor. But Warren hasn't been satisfied with setting an example as a businessman. When he decided to give his wealth back to society, he set an example as a philanthropist, too. His legacy will inspire generations to come," Gates said.

Tim Cook

The Apple CEO praised Buffett in an X post on Saturday.

"There's never been someone like Warren," Cook wrote. "It's been one of the great privileges of my life to know him. And there's no question that Warren is leaving Berkshire in great hands with Greg."

Jamie Dimon

Dimon, the chief executive of JPMorgan Chase and a fixture of Wall Street, praised Buffett in a message after the investor's big announcement.

"Warren Buffett represents everything that is good about American capitalism and America itself — investing in the growth of our nation and its businesses with integrity, optimism, and common sense," he said, per Reuters. "I've learned so much from him to this very day, and I am honored to call him a friend."

Brian Moynihan

Bank of America Chair and CEO Brian Moynihan told Business Insider that Buffett "has achieved unparalleled success over a seven-decade-plus career."

Bank of America was one of Berkshire Hathaway's largest holdings before it began to sell shares last year.

"Beyond his business success, his unprecedented philanthropic giving continues to be an example to follow," Moynihan told BI over email. "His life lessons delivered to young and old are as valuable as his business acumen. I have personally learned so much from him and look forward to continuing to benefit from his insights. He has been a tremendous supporter and investor in Bank of America and our nation's economy and the innovative spirit of the United States."

Bill Ackman

Bill Ackman, the billionaire CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, said on Monday he "wouldn't bet against Berkshire."

"I think they will be a little bit more aggressive about buying back stock. I don't see Berkshire waking up in six months and Berkshire announcing $100 billion acquisition," Ackman told CNBC's "Squawk Box."

The billionaire hedge fund manager said that Buffett's replacement, Greg Abel, "is a superb operator" who nonetheless may be cautious early on.

"I think the new CEO will be and the new board, not the new board, the current new CEO and the current board will be a little bit more careful on the first deals because if Berkshire's first deal turns out not to be a good one, you know, I think that the market will kind of frown upon that," Ackman said. "But I think the business will do very well."

Bill Gross

Billionaire investor and PIMCO cofounder Bill Gross told Business Insider via email that Buffett's vision set him apart from other investors.

"His vision was not limited to an optimistic vision of the future," Gross told BI. "Through his insurance holdings that by their structure allowed for the investment of premiums at a near zero cost into higher returning assets such as Coke, AMEX and Apple and in so doing he created a spread which over time led to billions and the recognition not just as a stock picker but as a financial structural wizard."

Gross also congratulated Buffett and recalled on X the first time his firm gave Berkshire one of its first loans in the mid '70s.

"I knew nothing about insurance and candy stores but was sold by his long-term vision of the economy and markets," Gross wrote. "Congratulations my friend — not just on the numbers — but on the philanthropy and the years. Having a cherry Coke with you was a highlight of my career."

Mark Cuban

Cuban told Business Insider in an email that Buffett was his "investing hero" and shared a photo of him with the investing legend at a Dairy Queen in Omaha.

"We used to go to DQ in Omaha," Cuban wrote. "It was the highlight of my year."

Following the announcement, Cuban also reposted on X a video showing Buffett receiving a standing ovation during the annual Berkshire Hathaway meeting.

Spencer Hakimian

Hakimian, the founder of Tolou Capital Management, shared a video on X of Buffett receiving a standing ovation from the crowd at Berkshire Hathaway's annual meeting.

"Curtain call for the captain," Hakimian wrote.

Ron Olson

Olson, a Berkshire Hathaway board member, told CNBC that Buffett has "lived a life full of surprises. Very few of his decisions have been anything but sensational. I am very anxious to see Warren become the Charlie Munger for Greg Abel."

Olson also believed Abel "is ready" for the role.

"I have no doubt about that. We've known it for a long time," Olson told the outlet.

French Hill

The Arkansas GOP congressman and former businessman told CNBC that Buffett, Abel, and Berkshire Hathaway's board "have done a magnificent job over the last decade preparing shareholders for today."

Hill added that he's admired Buffett since his college days.

"When I got out of government in 1993 and went back to the private sector in investment management, it was Warren Buffett who was my role model — a man I've never personally met, but I've admired all these years," Hill told the outlet.

Stephen Squeri

The chairman and CEO of American Express told Business Insider via email that Buffett "has had one of the most storied careers in the history of American business."

Squeri added that Buffett's "vision and deep sense of responsibility to shareholders is unmatched, and his humility and humor are rare qualities in a leader that have made working with Warren a delight."

He added that American Express, in which Berkshire Hathaway holds a minority stake, looks forward to "continuing to work with Greg as he builds upon Warren's legacy."

Seth Klarman

The CEO of the Baupost Group hedge fund told BI over email that Buffett ran an "investment marathon" for decades and excelled in all conditions.

"But he is more than an investor — he is a visionary business leader, teacher, role model, and philanthropist. I've always seen him as a mentor, and I suspect he'll keep contributing in all of these spheres far into the future. There will be no other like him!"

Howard Marks

The co-chairman of Oaktree Capital Management told BI in an email that it is "impossible" for anyone to measure up to Buffett.

"He is the single most influential investor of all time — the Isaac Newton of investing," Marks said.

"He says when he started in the early 1950s, he was able to buy dollars for 50 cents — and he makes it sound easy," Marks added. "But the thing is, even if the opportunities were there, nobody else did it. There weren't multiple Warren Buffetts."

Jim Cramer

Jim Cramer, the host of the CNBC show "Mad Money," called Buffett "our only G.O.A.T." in an X post on Sunday.

"In awe of Buffett and congratulate him on the greatest run of all time," Cramer wrote.

• World, a crypto and biometric security startup, hosted a keynote on Wednesday in San Francisco.
• I attended the event, which was packed with product launches and goodies.
• Here's what I saw at the Sam Altman-backed company event.

World, a crypto-slash-biometric security startup, had a splashy keynote on Wednesday at San Francisco's Fort Mason, where cofounders Sam Altman and Alex Blania had an Apple moment, with sleek product unveilings and their biggest push to date for an "everything app."

I went to see what the buzz was all about.

One of the more interesting selling points previously highlighted by my colleague Lakshmi Varanasi is that World, or at least Altman, is looking ahead to a time when artificial intelligence necessitates universal basic income. In the future, people could need a secure method to access their UBI — Altman proposes that World's iris-scanning Orb can provide that.

"The way that AI is going forward, I think we're going to have a problem with jobs," Patrick Sobczak, a curious attendee at World, told me. "I assume the main goal for this, or the end goal sometime in the future, is to provide infrastructure for universal basic income. At least that's my guess."

World's keynote didn't really go into that.

The startup's executives instead showed their all-encompassing secure platform called the World App, where users could freely connect, play games, and exchange currency. The Orb would be the security apparatus that helps protect everything on the platform.

Attendees who opened a World account also automatically got about $40 worth of Worldcoin crypto, as the coin launched that night for the first time in the US. Before, the coin was available in more than 20 countries in South America, Europe, Asia, and Africa.

The event included a ton of food, drinks, swag, and a surprise musical guest: Grammy Award-winner Anderson .Paak, performing under his alias DJ Pee .Wee.

I had a chance to use the orb and hear more about World's pitch.

Here are my takeaways.

World wants your iris — and your trust

One of its more curious projects is the 9-inch diameter Orb that scans your iris. The pitch is to create a secure device that verifies one's "humanity" in an age of increasingly sophisticated bots and artificial intelligence.

The process is simple and a bit amusing if not slightly dystopian.

The World App provides users with a QR code that the Orb scans. Then, the Orb asks you to "open your eyes wide" and "look into the mirror" of the device.

"Verifying your humanity" and "uniqueness," the app said as it uploaded my biometrics.

Once that was finished, the app welcomed me to the "World" and let me know where I ranked among the people who had joined the network. I'm the 12,732,325th person to be verified.

The World App also said that all of the iris data the Orb just collected is immediately deleted from the device.

Adrian Ludwig, chief information security officer of Tools for Humanity, the company that developed World, said during the evening's press conference that the Orb doesn't store images, and they are not transferred to any backend services.

"World doesn't hold those images, Tools for Humanity doesn't pull those images — they are encrypted and then given to the user," he said.

One of the pitches here is that Orb could be used as a secure POS system for a business, such as a coffee shop, without the need for an operator or worker.

The startup also debuted the Orb Mini, a smartphone-shaped device that people or businesses can use to verify another person's identity during a transaction.

Blania said that as the World network grows, he envisions a future where proof-of-humanity will be incredibly valuable to platforms such as dating apps. This, in turn, could open up lines of revenue in which World can charge fees to companies that want to use the verification system, he said.

Patriotism was an underlying theme of the night

"At Last" was the cryptic tagline and name of the event, and that moment was World's launch in the US, including six Orb stores and a cryptocurrency, Worldcoin.

"We started the company right here in San Francisco near South Park, and we wanted to scale it to the entire world," Blania said. "And so, of course, what has been missing is the United States of America."

The announcement triggered brief chanting from the audience: "USA, USA, USA!"

While the audience tuned into the keynote on one side of the venue, the other half of the building was quietly decorated with digital projections of stripes resembling those of the American flag.

The tote bag and merch were also branded with flag symbology.

"I think this is awesome. I'm a very proud American. I think America should like lead innovation, not fight it off," Altman said. "And this has been sort of a sad thing about tech in America. And so to kind of right this wrong, finally — I'm very happy."

Some reporters at the press conference were curious if World timed the launch with the arrival of the second Trump administration, which has promised to be more crypto-friendly.

"A lot of things influenced that decision," Blania said. "The political environment is certainly part of it, and kind of the outlook for regulatory clarity in the US was a big part of it. We really always take a very conservative approach in acting with regulators, because we think what we do is very, very important and very, very critical. And so we'd rather take it slowly and carefully, and that's how we treated the US before."

World has a long road ahead for adoption

World said that the app now has more than 26 million users and 12 million "verified" users.

Jake Brukhman, CEO of CoinFund and early investor in World, told me that the startup showed one of the "best Web3 go-to market that we've ever seen."

"I'm a crypto investor, so I care very much about bringing Web3 to mainstream consumers, mainstream businesses," he said, referring to the decentralized vision of the internet. "I think this is the strongest play to do that."

Still, the Orbs are far from ubiquitous, even in the city where the company was born.

World also has encountered various regulatory hurdles related to data collection and privacy practices in Spain, Argentina, Kenya, and Hong Kong.

"I think it's important to mention that there has only been one ban and that is in Hong Kong," Damien Kieran, Tools for Humanity's chief privacy officer and former Twitter executive, said after the keynote. "Otherwise, currently, we have many conversations."

The value of Worldcoin also has a long journey ahead. I watched the crypto's value fall a couple of cents throughout the night, from $1.08 to $1.06.

Some attendees told me this a wait-and-see moment for World.

Tarun Gogineni, an OpenAI researcher, told me "proof-of-human" is important, but was skeptical of World's approach.

"I don't think giving Orb access to seven billion people in the world is going to happen anytime soon," he said, adding, "The smartest people are not working on this right now."

• Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said US and China are close in the AI chip race, with China close behind.
• Nvidia previously said that the Trump administration plans to restrict its chip sales to China.
• The CEO also urged an "industry-oriented energy policy" that will encourage the growth of new tech.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said the US and China are neck and neck in the race for AI chip dominance and that America needs to implement energy policies that will accelerate emerging tech industries.

Huang told reporters on Capitol Hill Wednesday that "China is not behind" the US. And, when asked if China is ahead, Huang clarified, "China is right behind us. We're very, very close."

Nvidia, which produces some of the most expensive and sought-after chips for training and using artificial intelligence models, said in an SEC filing earlier this month that the Trump administration had informed the company that it would be restricting the sale of chips to China by requiring the tech giant to obtain special licenses to continue selling its H20 chips to Chinese customers.

As UBS analysts previously warned, "This is effectively a ban."

And even if the restrictions don't amount to an all-out ban, because the licensing process will probably be an intensive one, analysts expect Nvidia's revenue for its H20 chips to take a hit.

Huang also warned that Chinese telecommunications company, Huawei, which has moved into AI chip production, is becoming a major rival to Nvidia and US chip companies.

"There's no question that Huawei is one of the most formidable technology companies in the world, and they're incredible in computing," Huang told reporters. "They're incredible in networking technology and software capabilities, all of these capabilities to advance AI they have. They've made enormous progress in the last several years."

And in order to stay ahead of that competition, Huang urged the Trump administration to consider policies that not just accelerate the production of chips in the US, but that support the diffusion of those American-made chips around the world.

The Trump administration has not yet formally announced the restrictions on China chip sales that Nvidia first reported in its SEC filing. But, according to Reuters, Trump's team is discussing making the changes that would update Biden's "Framework for Artificial Intelligence Diffusion" rule, set to go into effect May 15, so that it could use chip sales as bargaining power over other countries in its trade war.

Later on Wednesday, during Trump's remarks on American investments at the White House, Huang praised Trump for pushing for domestic manufacturing initiatives that will help build out Nvidia's next generation technology. He added that the US needs energy policies that will push forward advancements in AI and emerging technology industries.

"In order for this industry to thrive, we need to build these systems of course, but we also need a progressive growth and industry-oriented energy policy, which this president has really put his weight behind and I really appreciate that," Huang said.

"Without energy," he added, "we can't possibly have new growth industries. And we now have the backing of the administration, the backing of President Trump, to support the creation of a whole new industry."

• Waymo's business has so far focused heavily on autonomous rideshare services.
• The company also wants to apply its autonomous driving technology to personally owned cars.
• Waymo said on Thursday that it's in early talks with Toyota to do just that.

Waymo put out a reminder that it doesn't just want to be another ride-share competitor.

The Alphabet-owned company announced Thursday that it's in early-stage talks with Toyota Motor Corporation to explore bringing its autonomous driving technology to personally-owned vehicles. The statement said that Toyota could also provide its vehicles to add to Waymo's robotaxi fleet.

"In parallel, the companies will explore how to leverage Waymo's autonomous technology and Toyota's vehicle expertise to enhance next-generation personally owned vehicles (POVs)," Waymo and Toyota said in a joint press release. "The scope of the collaboration will continue to evolve through ongoing discussions."

Waymo said in the announcement that it's building a "generalizable" autonomous driver that can be applied to different "vehicle platforms and businesses over time."

Developing a generalized autonomous driver is similar to the approach of companies like Tesla or Wayve. It refers to an autonomous driving system that can work in different environments and vehicles regardless of whether the system has been familiarized with a particular region.

"For example, when we first start driving in a new city, the same software that is active in other markets will allow the vehicle to drive well in a new environment," Chris Bonelli, a Waymo spokesperson, told Business Insider.

Currently, Waymo maps out a city or region before it deploys a robotaxi service to the public in that area. That's why Waymo's autonomous driver isn't often referred to as generalized AI.

Waymo has been heavily focused on expanding its robotaxi operations. The company said it now offers more than 250,000 rides weekly throughout the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Austin. It's also planning to expand its service to Atlanta, Miami, and Washington, DC.

Part of its scaling strategy includes partnering with rideshare platforms like Uber. In Phoenix, customers can order a Waymo on the Uber app. In Austin, Uber also oversees the maintenance of the Waymo robotaxi fleet.

Tesla has also said it will launch a pilot robotaxi service in Austin in June.

CEO Elon Musk said in the latest earnings call that Tesla is better positioned to scale a robotaxi service because its cars and autonomous driving technology are cheaper to develop and quicker to deploy. However, he has missed deadlines to deliver on those promises several times. In 2019, Musk said Tesla could bring one million robotaxis on the road by the next year.

The Toyota collaboration is a reminder that Waymo is thinking about how to leverage its autonomous driving technology to expand into other lines of business, like being a software and hardware provider to OEMs that sell personal cars.

Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said during Thursday's earnings call that there is "future optionality around personal ownership as well. "

Former Waymo CEO John Krafcik told Business Insider in March that anyone who doesn't know if Waymo wants to be more than just a rideshare competitor "hasn't been paying attention."

"Waymo has been clear on all of these business lines as applications for the Waymo Driver," he said.

• Mark Zuckerberg dropped out of Harvard University as a sophomore to focus on Facebook.
• The Meta CEO met his wife, Priscilla Chan, and friends who helped start Facebook in college.
• Zuckerberg told Theo Von that he's unsure if college prepares people enough for the workforce.

In a recent interview, Harvard University dropout Mark Zuckerberg said that he's not sure if colleges are preparing students enough for today's job market.

"I'm not sure that college is preparing people for like the jobs that they need to have today," Zuckerberg said in an interview with comedian Theo Von published on Monday. "I think there's a big issue on that and like all the student debt issues are like really big issues."

The Meta CEO said that college could be a formative "social experience" for students, as many leave home for the first time. Still, some people will have to decide whether higher education is worth going into debt.

"It would be one thing if it were just kind of like a social experience," he said. "If it's not preparing you for the jobs that you need and you're kind of starting off in this big hole, then I think that's not good. That I think there's gonna have to be a reckoning with and people are gonna have to kind of figure whether that makes sense."

According to data from CollegeBoard, the average student loan debt for those who graduated in 2022-23 was $29,3000 per borrower. Gen Z graduates this year face a tough job market amid layoffs in the tech and government sectors.

One 2024 study from Deloitte showed that a third of Gen Z and millennials opt out of higher education due to costs and career choices that don't require a degree.

"It's sort of been this taboo thing to say of like, maybe not everyone needs to go to college because there's, like, a lot of jobs that don't require that," Zuckerberg said. "But I think people are probably coming around to that opinion a little more now than maybe like 10 years ago."

Zuckerberg dropped out of Harvard in 2005 while a sophomore to focus on growing Facebook. Twelve years later, he received an honorary degree.

The CEO said in the interview that he met many people in college "who are really important in my life," including his wife, Priscilla Chan, Facebook cofounders, and people who are still close friends.

"It was good, I feel like you need some time kind of away from home a bit before you like, fully go out," he said of his time at boarding school and college.

When asked if students should be learning about artificial intelligence in middle or high school, Zuckerberg said technology changes a lot and that he's not using the same skills he learned when he was 15. Still, he added that there could be value in "understanding the technology and understanding how to use it."

Zuckerberg also said having good mentors or teachers is valuable, regardless of the class.

"When I was in boarding school, I really liked studying Latin and Greek, and that's like, not useful for any practical thing," he said, "But it's fun."

A Meta spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

• Elon Musk said he will spend less time on DOGE to focus more on Tesla starting in May.
• David Sacks said on the All-In podcast that Musk does the same thing when managing his companies.
• The VC said Musk has "intense bursts" of focus on one thing before going into "maintenance mode."

David Sacks, the White House crypto czar and close friend of Elon Musk, said on the latest All-In podcast that Musk's decision to spend less time at the White House DOGE office is indicative of his management style at his companies.

On the Friday episode, Sacks said that Musk is simply running DOGE like he typically runs his other companies, recalling the Twitter acquisition. Sacks was invited to help Musk purchase the social media platform and was a trusted confidant during the transition.

"I saw this before when I was part of the Twitter transition — is that for the first three months or so he was basically full time at Twitter HQ, learning the business down to the database level. I mean, every nook and cranny of that business, he learned about," Sacks said. "Once he felt like he had a mental model and he had the people in place that he trusted, he could move to more of a maintenance mode."

Musk said on Tuesday's Tesla earnings call that he'll scale back his time at DOGE and focus more on his EV company. The CEO said he'll spend a day or two a week on his government work "as long as it is useful."

The decision comes after investors and Wall Street analysts pleaded for the chief executive to re-align his priorities back to his company, as Tesla experienced sluggish sales and backlash from some of its core customer base.

Sacks said Musk's method is how he can simultaneously manage multiple companies, and the CEO can now step back from DOGE.

Musk "has these intense bursts where he focuses on something, gets the right people and structure in place, feels like he understands it, and then he can delegate more," he said. "And I think that he has reached that point with DOGE."

The venture capitalist said Musk isn't completely stepping down from his government role but is instead rationing his time in the White House. Musk is limited to 130 days per year as a designated special government employee.

"My sense is that DOGE is going to continue, it's just that Elon is shifting to a mode where he can manage it one day a week or two days a week as opposed to being there five days a week," he said.

While Sacks is not known to be a member of the DOGE team, the venture capitalist has had a yearslong personal and business relationship with Musk that can be traced back to their executive roles at PayPal. The two are part of what later became known as the PayPal Mafia, which also includes Peter Thiel and Reid Hoffman.

Musk and Sacks did not respond to requests for comment.

• Elon Musk said on Tuesday that Waymo robotaxis cost more money to build.
• The Tesla CEO said his company has the upper hand because of its ability to scale quickly.
• Ex-Waymo CEO John Krafcik told BI that Tesla still has a lot to prove.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk took multiple digs at one of his biggest competitors in the robotaxi race, Waymo, during Tuesday's earnings call.

Ex-Waymo CEO John Krafcik shot back: Check the scoreboard.

"Tesla has never competed with Waymo — they've never sold a robotaxi ride to a public rider, but they've sold a lot of cars," Krafcik said in an email to Business Insider. "And although Tesla hopes to compete with Waymo someday, they've failed utterly and completely at this for each of the 10 years they've been talking about it."

Krafick led Waymo between 2015 and 2021, overseeing the self-driving division's spin-out from Alphabet in 2016. He was replaced with two co-CEOs, Tekedra Mawakana and Dmitri Dolgov. Krafick currently serves on Rivian's board.

Tesla made another big push for its robotaxi bet during its latest earnings presentation.

Musk said the initial "pilot" rollout in Austin this June will consist of 10 to 20 robotaxis, using Tesla Model Ys. The ramp-up afterwards will be quick, he said, predicting "millions" of fully-autonomous Teslas on the road by the second half of next year and a market-share domination of "99% or something ridiculous."

The CEO sounded confident on the call about Tesla's approach to autonomy, which relies on cameras and a "generalized" AI that the company said will be able to adapt to various driving environments without the need of pre-mapping a particular region.

That's different from Waymo.

Waymo maps out a city like San Francisco or Tokyo with its cars before deploying a robotaxi service to the public, and it uses a generous set of lidar sensors and cameras.

Musk has said before that this approach is arduous and expensive, and he reiterated his point during the earnings call.

"The issue with Waymo's cars is it costs way more money," Musk said, making a play on Waymo's name. "Rim shot."

He later added: "Waymo decided that an expensive sensor suite was the way to go, even though Google's very good at AI. It's ironic."

Musk estimated that Tesla could make robotaxis that cost a "quarter to 20%" less than the cost of Waymo's Jaguar I-PACE vehicles — and it'll do so at higher volumes through its unique manufacturing methods.

Krafcik, the ex-Waymo CEO, thinks the cost talk is a moot point when considering safety.

In the long run, the cost of sensors has a "trivial cost-per-mile impact over the useful life of a robotaxi," he told BI," while also providing massive quantifiable safety benefits."

'Undelivered promises'

Tesla's robotaxi vision hinges on a key piece of technology it calls Full Self-Driving, which is powered by the company's own hardware stack.

To date, the company has not rolled out a public version of the software that operates without the supervision of a human driver.

On Wednesday, the company shared a post on X, previewing the robotaxi app and service in Silicon Valley. Tesla said in the post that the company has completed over 1,500 trips and 15,000 miles of driving.

The video showed a person hailing a Model Y. One scene showed a safety operator sitting behind the wheel.

RBC Capital Markets analyst Tom Narayan said in his latest forecast that Tesla could generate $80 billion in robotaxi revenue a year in the US by 2040.

Krafcik is skeptical.

"Well, after 10 years of undelivered promises, it seems pretty rational for those watching to be data- and evidence-driven," he said. "There's still a lot of promises, still no Tesla liability for FSD driving performance, and still no universal robotaxi service."

The former CEO acknowledged that Tesla's FSD has improved, but he argued that that's different from showing that the company has a safe, "truly autonomous" robotaxi service.

Tesla and Waymo did not respond to a request for comment.